Saturday, May 29, 2010

JFK's Shades

Thanks to an Anonymous commenter in the previous post I was pointed towards the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum which catalogs many of JFK's personal effects. If you look under "Sunglasses" you will see that while JFK did indeed wear Wayfarer style glasses his actual shades appear to be made by American Optical ("True color Polaroid tc74-51") and Titmus ("Cabana TS 2505"). While it is wholly possible that JFK did wear Ray-Ban Wayfarers at some point in his life I think it is more accurate to site AO's Saratoga model as his sunglasses of choice - in the iconic Wayfarer style, but lacking Ray Ban branding and featuring much slimmer stems.

i have been searching for JFK sunglasses for a while too and i just bought a pair of Ray-Ban RB4147's that are a really great compromise. they come in a lot of colors, including tortoise shell, and look very much like the JFK's. they have a straighter angle, and the thin stems that differentiates the JFK's from a wayfarer. the pictures on ray-ban's website dont do the glasses justice. they look much more like the real deal in person. check them out!

Hello, I have a pair of American Optical "Saratoga" but I saw several photos of it are President Saratoga as the end but have different branches on the wider end weird .... I saw a sale on Ebay of Optical Sunglasses, Cat Eye Cosmetan it are exactly the same as the Saratoga I do not understand here is the link: http://cgi.ebay.fr/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=360457862127&ssPageName=STRK:MESINDXX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1436.l2649#ht_3746wt_1031

JFK's sunglasses have been reproduced by Camrose & Kross and were sold on QVC tonight (Aug 18, 2012). There's a video of the sales presentation here:http://www.qvc.com/Camrose-&-Kross-John-F-Kennedy-ClassicSunglasses-Tortoise,.product.A229685.html?upsh=1&sc=A229685-CSWB